China completes two launches todayChina today completed two launches using two different rockets from two different spaceports.
First, its Long March 4C rocket lifted off from its Xichang spaceport in southwest China, placing what its state-run press described as a satellite designed to do “space environment exploration and related technology tests,” No other information was released.
Next, its Long March 6A rocket lifted off from its Taiyuan spaceport in north China, placing the ninth set of Guowang satellites into orbit for a planned 13,000 constellation designed to compete with Starlink and Kuiper. This launch placed five satellites into orbit, bringing the total launched so far to 72.
In both cases, no word was released on where the rockets’ lower stages crashed inside China. This is especially significant for the Long March 4C rocket, which uses very toxic hypergolic fuels and lifted off from a spaceport much more inland than the Long March 6A.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
100 SpaceX
46 China
11 Rocket Lab
9 Russia
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 100 to 79.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
China today completed two launches using two different rockets from two different spaceports.
First, its Long March 4C rocket lifted off from its Xichang spaceport in southwest China, placing what its state-run press described as a satellite designed to do “space environment exploration and related technology tests,” No other information was released.
Next, its Long March 6A rocket lifted off from its Taiyuan spaceport in north China, placing the ninth set of Guowang satellites into orbit for a planned 13,000 constellation designed to compete with Starlink and Kuiper. This launch placed five satellites into orbit, bringing the total launched so far to 72.
In both cases, no word was released on where the rockets’ lower stages crashed inside China. This is especially significant for the Long March 4C rocket, which uses very toxic hypergolic fuels and lifted off from a spaceport much more inland than the Long March 6A.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
100 SpaceX
46 China
11 Rocket Lab
9 Russia
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 100 to 79.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
I fully expect them to ramp up.
Here, Elon launches most American assets and most of the (non-polarized) public are content to let him do it.
China is worrisome in that they want everybody and their brother know how to launch….and a plethora of options to choose from….moving towards WWII type logistics where spacelift is FULLY welcomed….while our Space Force still plays second fiddle to the USAF.
Let’s war game a little…and imagine things were reversed.
The United States has a broad industrial base here—lots of space launch options. We are second, but space startups are funded as a matter of pride
In China, one individual was somehow allowed to be a billionaire (the ruling classes might as well be).
Here, China is first only because their playboy thinks he’s Hugo Drax.
China begins shutting down facilities…turning inward as they did before when they stupidly burned their fleets.
China only cares about robo-games, here….and many factories once there are in the United States now.
Now—libertarian tinted glasses off—you tell me which scenario is healthier overall.
Jeff Wright,
I expect the PRC to try to ramp up. Whether it will succeed is another matter. It has been stuck at a bit over 60 launches per year for the last three years. Perhaps it will get to 70 this year. That will require another two dozen launches by year’s end, but the PRC has a history of launching more in the back half of the year than in the front half.
But all of the PRC’s launch vehicles are still entirely expendable. Work is going forward on several new models that are intended to feature recoverable 1st stages, but that has been true for several years now and none of these has yet achieved a booster landing after an orbital launch even as a test, never mind in regular service. Meanwhile, Falcon 9 continues to set a new record every year.
I think what we are seeing is that the PRC is limited in both production and launch facility capability and that, until routine reusability is achieved with some new vehicle, what we’ve been seeing these past few years is really about all the PRC can do even at full chat.
But one cannot assume ongoing annual progress where the PRC is concerned. It has a lopsidedly export-oriented manufacturing economy but also requires millions of tonnes of raw materials annually to feed both its manufacturing base and its population. Neither the US nor Europe seem inclined to continue accepting unlimited quantities of PRC-made goods. Both the Biden regime and the Trump administration have been sharply more protectionist than previous administrations and PRC labor productivity is so low that new investment there by outsiders is pretty much a non-starter. By almost every metric, the PRC economy is on a long-term downhill trajectory.
The only thing really mitigating this, ironically, is the parallel long-term downhill trajectory of its total population and the yet steeper downhill trajectory of its working-age population. At least three people are dying in the PRC for each new birth and the ratio may well be even higher given the government’s uniform tendency to cook the stats or just quit reporting them entirely.
I have no idea how you see the US as “second” in any way to the PRC where space is concerned. All of the PRC space launch “start-ups” are simply mechanisms to attract private PRC capital to what are still very much state-directed firms. Private PRC capital has very few investment options compared to the West. The veneer of private enterprise also serves as a mechanism to save face for the state-run space launch apparat when inevitable new-vehicle failures occur.
There are a lot more billionaires in the PRC than merely one. Over 500, in fact.
The rest of your post is hard to parse – a product, I assume, of your usual habit of apparently assuming the rest of us can read your mind. The only thing you’ve unambiguously got right is noting the tsunami of reshoring that is boosting the US manufacturing sector.
That reshoring can’t come fast enough.
Perhaps robotics will make up for the labor shortfall if Moravec’s paradox can be overcome. China has problems certainly—but they value intelligence..
“In both cases, no word was released on where the rockets’ lower stages crashed inside China. This is especially significant for the Long March 4C rocket, which uses very toxic hypergolic fuels and lifted off from a spaceport much more inland than the Long March 6A.”
Rockets are easier and cheaper to build when you don’t take into consideration things like the environment and safety.
Ever notice how we don’t hear anything about communism anymore? That’s because they’ve switched tactics and are taking down the west through leftist causes like environmentalism (“watermelons: green on the outside, red on the inside”) and racism.
And yet communist countries are the most oppressive, polluted countries. 80% of China’s drinking water is polluted, not just with human waste but toxins, carcinogens and heavy metals. Don’t buy food from China. It’s grown and processed with that water. Go to the Chinese food section of your grocery store and you’ll see red warning labels on food imported from China.
Jeff Wright,
Reshoring has actually been going on at a pretty good clip for some time, though the second Trump administration has, admittedly, lit an afterburner behind the process.
Moravec’s Paradox is being largely offset by Moore’s Law. An autonomous humanoid robot can now easily pack enough computational horsepower to do many industrial jobs.
The PRC at least pretends to value intelligence. What it actually values is obedience.
And, yes, the PRC has “problems” – though that seems far too mild a word to describe inevitable existential doom.
What is the major conduit for spacecraft IP leakage to China, and what can be done about it?
Predictions of doom for the PRC based on aging population look premature when a quick search turns up 300 million Chinese under the age of 18. Roughly 4 times the number of Americans under 18. The problems of am top down economy though are very real. Many of the Chinese start ups both in management and government connections probably resemble Boeing and Lockmart on the high end, and the SBR shops on the low end.
A focus on moving us ahead is vastly more productive than looking for the problems of others. Japan of 1941-42 punched far above its weight militarily when any reasonable analysis would have suggested otherwise. The US has massive advantages. Unfortunately advantages can be squandered. An assault on the super rich is one way to do that as it is basically an assault on the successful.